1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an automatic classifying apparatus for white blood cells, and more particularly to such apparatus which is capable of detecting the nucleus and cytoplasm of white blood cells by way of an electric signal corresponding to the light passing through the blood smear with a red, green or blue color filter being interposed therebetween.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Generally, the morphological, density and color informations of the nucleus and cytoplasm (including granules) of the white blood cell are the important factors in effecting classification of the white blood cells, and therefore it is essential to extract the nucleus and cytoplasm of the while blood cells in performing automatic classification of such blood cells. It is known, however, that in the case of a picture obtained by using white or single color light, the density level of the red blood cells or smudge existing in plurality around a white blood cell is very high and retards extraction of the nucleus and cytoplasm of the white blood cell. Therefore, in automatic classification of the white blood cells, it needs to eliminate the red blood cell and/or smudge image, which is a noise component, by using other means to allow stabilized extraction of the nucleus and cytoplasm image of the white blood cell. It is particularly noted that since said cytoplasm is not always high in density, discrimination thereof from the back-ground of the blood smear is very difficult. It is also necessary to extract and quantify the chromatin in the nucleus as density information.